Mysteries of the Knights Templar

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Templar secret initiation rites

When the Templars were arrested throughout France on 13th October 1307, one of the key accusations brought by the King of France, Philip the Fair, against the order was that their initiation rites involved denying Christ and spitting on the cross. So what is true?

Frale has an explanation for strange initiation rites

Under torture – the rack and the strapado – many Templars gave differing accounts of their initiation that involved the above as well as illicit kisses to the base of the spine, navel and mouth. But it was the desecration of the crucifix that shocked medieval opinion. These were supposed to be religious warriors fighting for Christendom in the Holy Land and they were denouncing their own faith in private.

The Vatican secret archives historian Barbara Frale offers an explanation that this was a form of psychological testing of Templar knights. If they were captured by the Saracens, then they would more than likely be forced by the enemy to reject Christ, spit on the cross and convert to Islam. Or so it was believed.

This test stripped bare a man’s true character, and it was at that point that courage, pride, determination, and the capacity for self-control emerged – all essential qualities for a Templar…

As for some of the other more lewd aspects of the initiation, Frale argues that the whole thing was about bending the individual will to the collective needs of the order – that a knight would do what he was told by this superiors without question. Frale claims that there were abbreviated ceremonies for more well-connected initiates and one boy related to the king of England was excused spitting directly on to the cross, instead spitting on the preceptor’s hand.

However, this failed to convince king Philip who viewed this bizarre rite as a very strong excuse for banning the Templars, burning dozens of them and confiscating their property.

One Comment on “Templar secret initiation rites”

There is a good deal of evidence to show that the Templar Knights were influenced by Islamic beliefs whose beliefs were similar to those of the dualism of the Cathars who had in taken their beliefs from Mary Magdalene, and consequently Jesus and his tutor John the Baptist which were ancient Jewish Hermetic and Kabalistic beliefs now better known as Gnosticism. These were the true original Christian beliefs which were changed by Paul and later became known as Roman Catholicism and is why the Catholics were so keen to purge the Templars who were in effect their rivals. The new novel The Royal Secret at www,theroyalsecret.info tells this thrilling story and much more of its influence on King Arthur and later the Tudors and Shakespeare himself.